December 14, 2004: Tattoos
Milk: 1996, San Francisco, California (I'm violently allergic to dairy products)
Birds: 1997, Tossa del Mar, Spain (I was part of the I Can Fly graf crew)
Anchor: 2000, New York City, New York (Reminder to keep my feet on ground)
Juggler: 1994, Binghamton, New York (My high school nickname was Jugz)
[Unrelated: Eliot and Mike said $1000+ is too much to pay for a lens, so I went back and assembled the following options for the two lenses I'd like to buy. Wide-Zoom $1369, $649, $369. 85mm Telephoto $1475, $340. Any opinions? What would you buy?]
Comments
For Chrissakes, stop with the tattoo pictures!
too much information? i can't even tell any more. just wait until tomorrow: pictures of each of my toenails.
Thompson the cat: 2005, NYC, NY (public display of love for the photogenic feline)
i think you need to shave some of that the next time you take photos like that.
i need to go wash my eyes with a brillo pad.
I think the 85mm Telephoto is unnecessary. I have the 1.4 50mm and I think it's fantastic. For the other set, if you can afford the 16-35, get it. My girlfriend has it and it is much better than my 20-35, even though I'm relatively happy with it. If someone gave me $1500, stuck a gun to my head and forced me to buy camera equiptment, the 16-35 would be way up on my list.
The main thing on the wide zooms is the level of distortion... I assume the $1400 has better performance, but you should compare them carefully on that issue. One reason I love the Nikon 12-24 is it has the least distortion I've seen in a lense of that class. Particularly given how much architecture you shoot, a cheap WA could make you very unhappy... I used to have a Sigma and it was okay for nature (no straight lines) but terrible in any urban or architectural use.
For the 85, get the cheap one... the DOF on that lens once you put it on a 1.6 crop SLR is so fine you'll find it's almost impossible to get any more out of having the extra half-stop. Plus the 1.8 is lighter.
Is there an equivalent of http://www.kenrockwell.com/nikon/nikkor.htm for Canon lenses? Because I heart the discontinued $150 70-210mm that site recommended.
From one who learned the hard way....pay the extra money and get a good lens. The difference is amazing!
1) get a f/2.8. f/3.5-4.5 lenses are for poor schmucks like me (I hardly ever use mine).
2) wide angles suck. the only time I would use a wide angle is if I needed to take pictures inside a tank. or kids on skateboards.
3) f/1.8 is sufficient. unless you are Stanley Kubrick, f/1.2 is going overboard.
4) it doesn't matter what you get. in the end it's more important to figure out how to make your lens do what it does best. every lens has a sweet spot.
Well Jake, I would suggest you the EF 17-40L USM ( http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=productlist&A=details&Q=&sku=279582&is=USA ) at $670. Good lens at quite cheap price. The 85mm is usually used for portraits... Do you shoot portraits?
Anyway the best thing is to rent for a couples of days and try.
To 990000: the history of photojournalism is made by wide angle lens, every photojournalist uses wides... I don't think wide sucks... ;)
bah. wide sucks. it makes the world look "cool" in all the wrong ways.
I would suggest the 16-35...you'll always be yearning for those 4mm if you don't. And is any fixed lens necessary on a DSLR?
Once you consider the 1.6 FOV crop of your dSLR, the 20mm is hardly a wide angle -- at 32mm, it's really more a normal-range zoom. Even the 16mm is only a 25mm, the bare beginnings of wide-angle-ness. If what you want is a wide angle, check out the sigma ultra-wide zoom, but know that it's a very heavy piece of glass with an exposed front element -- but it does have a more reasonable price.
what is all this camera-lens nerd gibberish? i like the MILK tattoo.
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